#bannorn

Doing my detailed Ferelden map got me to thinking about the subcultures of the different Ferelden regions. Here are some of the headcanons I came up with:

- Highever culture is what most foreigners would think of if they were asked to describe a Fereldan. They love their dogs, they speak plainly, they are devout Theirin loyalists and yet somehow paradoxically devoted to their independence. They have a decent relationship with Free Marchers, but harbour a distrust for the more extravagant nations. They have an old rivalry with Amaranthine, which can be variably friendly, bitter or downright violent depending on the individual.

- Amaranthine is quickly overtaking Denerim as the international trade hub of Ferelden. The wealthiest people in Amaranthine are more likely to be merchants than nobles. They have a reputation for being more interested in other nation’s cultures than their own. While that’s not always fair, they are the most cosmopolitan Fereldans and are more likely to be comfortable around foreign cultures. An exception to this rule is Orlesians, with whom they have a deeply ambivalent relationship.

- It’s a common joke that people from Denerim forget that the rest of Fereldan exists. It’s a paradoxical place, being both a destination for Andrastian pilgrims and a hotbed of crime. There’s a societal divide between people who live there year-round and people who come in for the Landsmeet and go back to the country afterwards. The latter are easily spotted by their difficulty navigating the higgledy-piggledy streets.

- Gwaren is somewhat disconnected from the rest of Fereldan. They use a lot of regional slang. If your family hasn’t been there for at least three generations, they’ll view you as an outsider. They have a sizeable but quiet population of people who follow pre-Andrastian folk religions (I am mostly stealing this from grandenchanterfiona, ‘cause I think it’s a cool idea). They are famous for their seafood, especially smoked fish. They have a tense relationship with the Dalish elves living in the Brecilian forest, but for the most part they stick to the coasts and leave the Dalish to the trees.

- South Reach folk, on the other hand, are more openly hostile towards elves, especially those living in the lands bordering the Brecilian forest. There are frequent disputes over farming and lumber rights, often breaking out into skirmishes. This becomes less pronounced as you go north-west towards the Drakon; in fact there’s a pretty sharp divide between the river regions and the forest ones, so much that they’ve often been ruled separately. However, the mistrust of elves is still present in the river villages; it’s just more likely to be directed at itinerant field-hands than at the Dalish.

- Stenhold folk have a bit of a siege mentality, as they border the Brecilian forest on one side and the Korcari Wilds. They have a mistrust of outsiders rivalled only by Gwaren folk. Their region doesn’t have a lot of arable land, so they rely on exports of pelts and lumber.

- Redcliffe folk are kind of the middle child of Ferelden. Their region is the most powerful of the arlings, but it’s not a teyrnir. People in the Western Hills, South Reach or the bannorn see them as uppity, while those in Highever or Denerim think they aren’t nearly as important as they think they are.  

- People from the Western Hills have a similar mentality to that of Stenhold, except with the Avvar instead of the Dalish. If forced to pick a side, most would grudgingly say they’d rather fight alongside the Avvar than the Chasind. There’s a friendly rivalry between the villages around Lake Luthias, who mostly get by on farming, and those towards the Frostbacks that are more based around mining.

- Edgehall Arling and the other regions between the Frostbacks and Lake Calenhad have the most Avvar influences on their cultures. As you get further into the mountains, the Avvar influences get more pronounced, in clothing, names and dialects, with some settlements like Tearkeld or Whitekeld being almost indistinguishable from Avvar strongholds. To lowlanders at least; the people who live there can tell the differences perfectly well, thank you.

Outside of Gwaren, this region houses the highest numbers of people with pre-Andrastian beliefs, and many more whose Andrastianism is tinged with folk beliefs or is highly heterodox (the cult at Haven was situated here).

Around the gates to Orzammar there’s (unsurprisingly) a lot more dwarven influences. The people of this region take great pride in their connection to Orzammar and consider it their duty to help newly-surfaced dwarfs acclimate. Although the less scrupulous among them have been known to sell them charms supposedly to keep them from falling into the sky.

- As you get closer to Jader, there’s a cultural and linguistic continuum between Ferelden and Orlais. People here will sometimes speak a dialect of Ciriane at home and the common tongue when around people from outside their communities. Naturally this means they are sometimes treated with suspicion from the more traditionally Fereldan types, especially in recent decades.

-The constantly shifting borders and loyalties in the Bannorn mean that, while the nobles hold some of the fiercest grudges in Ferelden (which is saying something), the peasants have a sense of solidarity. After all, when your village might end up in the territory of another Bann this time next year, it pays to be friendly towards your neighbours.

That said, Bannorn freeholders can be some of the most ferocious when it comes to land disputes. For this reason there are some regions that have made a tradition of avoiding bloodshed by solving these disputes using competitions, such as a footrace or a tug-of-war. There’s even one region where the challenge is to see who can knit the longest scarf in a set time.

“The traditional start of the year, this holiday involves visits to neighbors and family (in remote areas, this was once an annual check to ensure everyone was alive), as well as a town gathering to commemorate the year past, accompanied by drinking and merriment.”  [Theodosian Holidays]

“First Day in Ferelden?  I can say little about how the day is commemorated in Denerim, but Honnleath’s celebration is similar to most villages in Ferelden.  As evening fell on Year’s End Night, my brother, sisters, and I would run through the house, banging on all the walls and floors as loudly as we could, supposedly to drive demons away.”  

“This noise would mingle with carousing in the village streets, as the people banged pots and pans, rang druffalo bells, and generally made a racket as they made their way to the center of town.”

“As we counted down the hours to midnight, the children of the village would gather pine boughs, bringing them to the golem that stood in the center of Honnleath.  The golem would be draped with evergreens and apples, and we would arrange our pine branchs to spiral out from the statue.  As the old year died, we would light candles starting at the center radiating out to the edges, bringing light to the darkness.  The last candle would be lit as the Chantry bell rang out to mark the midnight hour and the beginning of the new year.”

“Each family in town would take one of the candles back to their home to relight the hearth fire.  It was said that if the candle went out before the hearth could be rekindled, misfortune would follow in the new year.  If the previous year had been kind, however, you would take some of the hearth ashes to friends and neighbors to spread in their fields in the spring to bring them good fortune in the future.  I never could see a difference myself, but it is a pleasant thought.

“The next morning, my whole family would set out to visit friends and family living outside of Honnleath, my brother and sisters bundled in so many layers of wool and linen that we could roll in the snow with little consequence.  And we often did.”

“When we would stop for a breath, we children would make patterns in the snow.  A tradition across most of Ferelden, I have since learned.  A Chantry sun or spiral like the one created in Honnleath’s square the night before were the patterns most favored by my family.  Lady Morrigan has since informed me that some of these symbols hail from the Dragon Cult in ancient Tevinter while others belong to elves of Arlathan.  I should ask Kieran to help me trace a Sword of Mercy overlaying the sun in the garden at the next snowfall.  Morrigan would surely appreciate its historical significance.”

“But my mind wandered.  Apologies.  When we finally arrived at the farmhold we were visiting, there was always some jostling for who would cross the threshold first.  My Father’s family held that it was best for a person with dark hair to have the first footing of the new year while my Mother’s people insisted that fair hair was far more lucky.  If my Mother’s view won out, as it often did, I would be pushed to the front of the family with a package full of small gifts to bring good fortune for our friends or relatives.”

“We would stay long enough to reminisce on the year past, toast the coming year, and share a very welcome warm meal and drink, then set off to see the next family.  Some years we would be gone as long as a week, traveling from one farmhold to the next to see how everyone fared.”

“Things were quite different, of course, once I began my training as a templar and later in Ferelden’s Circle.  In light of all that has happened, I look back at those childhood memories with ever more fondness.  Simpler times, I suppose.”

Thedas Calendar First Day in Ferelden - A Cullen Ficlet Wintersend in Nevarra - A Cassandra Drabble Summerday in Orlais - A Vivienne Ficlet All Soul’s Day in Starkhaven - A Sebastian Ficlet